HN Explorer

Ask HN: Which cities outside the Bay Area would you move to?

2 points by thoughtfox ↗ HN
I am a 35 year old software engineer currently living in San Francisco. I’ve lived here for the past 10 years and have loved each of those years. However I’ve reached a point where I would like to move to a more affordable city: one that allows me to lead a more balanced life than what I’m living today. I’ve seen occasional HN comments where a few folks have chimed in about alternate cities to the ones in the Bay Area. While I understand that the Bay area provides the most interesting and challenging tech jobs, I’m ready and willing to forgo all that at this point in my life. So, I’d like to ask folks for their insight about cities in the US/Canada that have a good set of tech opportunities and in their point of view affords them a high quality of life.

7 comments

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iamjdg
Portland, Austin, Boulder/Denver, Victoria, Edmonton, Saskatoon. "Good set of tech opportunities" is always relative and based on opinion, but these lower cost, high quality life cities do have some tech opportunities based on my experiences and info I have come across.
Powerofmene
Portland, Seattle, Austin, or Atlanta. Currently live in Nashville and it has been a great move for me and the family. Nashville always has a number of tech jobs available especially within the many healthcare businesses. It is home to a number of corporate headquarters and is always attracting new businesses. It is very affordable and has a lot of entertainment whether you like music, sports, the arts, etc. Another plus is TN boasts NO state income tax.
thoughtfox
I've been looking at Nashville, I loved visiting there! I'm glad to know you like living there!
Powerofmene
It is really nice although the humidity is awful. Job opportunities are plentiful and we are within a days Drive of Atlanta, the beach, Louisiville if you like horse races and have many annual events such as the Steeplechase, etc. TPAC is great if you enjoy plays and of course we have the Titans and the Predators if you like sports events. College football is huge here so you can get your fill of football or basketball as well. Downtown is host to weekly music events during the summer and we have a lot of festivals throughout the year and of course we have Fan Fair annually if you like country music. We also have 13 universities/colleges if you are seeking higher education. and you can live in Nashville or in the surrounding counties with anywhere from a 30 minute to one hour commute time if you drive to work during the typical business hours.

Not to sound like an advertisement but it really is a great place to live and work. Cost of living is very reasonable but we do have one of the highest sales tax rates in the nation (just shy of 10%) but our property taxes are very low and again, no state income tax.

bradknowles
Austin.

I got a call years ago from a recruiter to go work at Apple Retail Software Engineering, through their contract-to-hire process. I lived and worked in Cupertino for about six months, but it was clear things weren't working out. When the contract ended, I was very relieved that I could move back to Austin.

If they had made me an offer to convert, they would have had to pay me north of $250k/year in order to afford to live anywhere remotely close to the office and make it worthwhile. At that time, rent for a small 1BR apartment was well north of $2k/month, and that is much higher than my monthly mortgage payment here in Austin for a 4BR/3BA house in a very nice neighborhood.

thoughtfox
Thanks! I have heard that Austin is becoming a gateway from Silicon Valley, do you think prices for apartments/houses are still reasonable?
billconan
sacramento, ca

boulder/fort collins, co